Morality, Religion & Philosophy: September 2006 Archives
Although the topic of taqiyya, like many religious concepts, is certainly more complex than can be explained in a blog post, I think it's important to understand because it underscores how differently Muslims and Christians tend to view lying. Most broadly, Ahmad ibn Naqib al-Misri wrote:
Speaking is a means to achieve objectives. If a praiseworthy aim is attainable through both telling the truth and lying, it is unlawful to accomplish it through lying because there is no need for it. When it is possible to achieve such an aim by lying but not by telling the truth, it is permissible to lie if attaining the goal is permissible..., and obligatory to lie if the goal is obligatory. ...One should compare the bad consequences entailed by lying to those entailed by telling the truth, and if the consequences of telling the truth are more damaging, one is entitled to lie...
So it shouldn't be a suprise that Muslim nations don't tend to negotiate in good faith as Westerners understand it. As the Left constantly admonishes, it's important to get to know other cultures! (So we can defeat them.)
In a surreal display of ignorant submission, Pope Benedict sucks up to Muslims who want to behead him.
Speaking amid tighter security at his weekly general audience in St Peter's Square, the Pope repeated the thrust of remarks made on Sunday that his words had been misunderstood and expressed "profound respect" for Muslims [who want to murder him]. ...He expressed his "profound respect for the great religions, particularly for Muslims, who worship the one God and with whom we are committed to defending and promoting together social justice, moral values, peace and freedom for all humanity."
Even though, of course, Islam doesn't worship the same God as Christianity and few Muslims are committed to any of the things in the Pope's list, instead being intently focused on waging jihad against the infidels, burning American flags and Pope dolls, and beheading everyone in sight.
Either the Pope is amazingly ignorant, a sniveling coward, or he really does "profoundly respect" Islam and should probably convert because he clearly doesn't "profoundly respect" Christianity.
I've written about female abortion and infanticide in Arab and Muslim countries, but this article about Indians using abortion for gender selection really highlights how much "womens' rights" can cost a society -- especially baby women.
PATTRAN, India (Reuters) - Manual laborer Gulzar Singh is haunted by the day he exhumed baby fetuses from a pit outside an abortion clinic in one of the grisliest chapters in India's fight against female feticide."Inside the well I found bones. Small ones. Little, little ones. There were some baby skulls too," recalled Singh with a shudder.
Singh was ordered by police in early August to dig up pits on the grounds of a private hospital in Pattran, a small town in the Punjab state, which was suspected of operating an illegal abortion clinic.
It was a job that would change his life.
Over the next few hours, he removed the remains of scores of unborn babies from two deep pits, an experience he says he will never forget and one which leaves him struggling for breath at night and unable to enjoy the company of friends.
Singh says he removed the flesh and bones of around 300 aborted babies. The authorities say it was somewhere between 20 to 100 fetuses and they assume that all were female although gender tests results will only be ready next month.
Does the fact that most aborted babies around the world are female make any impact on those "feminists" who advocate the "right to choose [to kill babies]"?
According to a study published in the British medical journal, the Lancet, about 10 million female fetuses may have been aborted in India over the last 20 years.Traditionally, India's patriarchal society has preferred boys over girls. Across its rural landscape an often-used blessing for daughter-in-laws is "May you be the mother of 100 sons".
In Punjab and the neighboring state of Haryana, where many girls are believed to be killed in the womb or soon after birth, sex ratios have been heavily skewed.
According to the 2001 census, the latest official population data, the national sex ratio was 933 girls to 1,000 boys whereas in Punjab it was 798 girls to 1,000 boys in 2001, compared to 875 in 1991.
So let's recap the morality of American leftists. Recognizing that there may be a biological basis for the differences in male and female performance in the sciences: bad. Slaughtering millions of girls in the womb: good.
The news story isn't entirely clear, but it appears that perhaps even babies that have been born aren't considered people anymore. Anna Nicole Smith's son Daniel died while visiting his mother in the hospital afer she gave birth to a daughter. The death was suspicious for whatever reason, and the story is concerned about who was in the room at the time.
Daniel Smith died Sunday while visiting his mother, a reality TV star and former Playboy playmate, in her hospital room three days after she gave birth to a baby girl. ...The chief inspector of the Bahamas coroner's office on Wednesday called the death of the 20-year-old Smith "suspicious" and a formal inquiry that could lead to criminal charges was scheduled for next month.
Police also revealed that a third person was in the hospital room at the time of the death.
But Scott said that the third person was another one of Anna Nicole Smith's attorneys, Howard K. Stern.
It's not definite, but isn't it likely that Smith's baby girl was also in the room, making four people? Granted, it's unlikely that the baby was involved in the death, but I still think she should be counted as a "pesron", if in fact she was present.
What, me nit-picky? Paul Hsieh posts a list of self-referential logical fallacies that is quite amusing (later augmented by Steven Den Beste). My only issue with the fomulations he posts is with the Complex Question fallacy, which he states thusly:
Complex Question:Have you stopped beating your wife and saying Complex Question isn't the best fallacy?
The problem is that the Complex Question fallacy is supposed to (improperly) group together two issues, one of which has a clearly correct position. By grouping a debatable question with an obvious question, the fallacy tries to apply the obvious answer to the debatable issue through (improper) association.
However, the "have you stopped beating your wife" question was originally designed not to have an obvious answer, and is therefore particularly unsuited for use in the Complex Question fallacy. Neither "yes" nor "no" is clearly the right answer, and so there's no false association to be made between beating one's wife and believing that Complex Question is the best fallacy.
A better formulation would be something like:
- "Do you agree that failing to recognize the supremacy of the Complex Question fallacy and beating your wife are grievous offenses?"
- "Isn't it terrible that so many people disparage the Complex Question fallacy and beat their wives?"
